Description:
Located inside the Crown Center Hotel, this TV location opened in 1973.
Date of closing is as yet unknown. The hotel is still in operation and is part of the Westin Hotels & Resorts Corporation. According to an employee who remembers the Trader Vic's when it was there, the space where the restaurant was is now divided up into meeting and banquet spaces.

My good buddy Silverline and I visited this site last year and he took several photos of the location as it looks today. We will add them here later. For now, here is a postcard and a lovely little box of wooden matches issued to celebrate the 5th anniversary of the KC Vic's in 1978. First one of these I've seen.

As with many Tiki locations that have since closed while the building remains, you'd have a hard time picturing the grandeur of the Trader Vic's Crown Center location as it looks today.

This was the main entrance from the outside. You could also enter from inside the hotel/shopping area.

Once you're through the doors there's not much to go on as to where anything was located or how it was decorated.

The only thing that gives any clue as to what was once here is the carpeting, which may or may not date to the closing of this location.

The only things that remain the same are the decor outside the restaurant and still inside the Westin Crown Center. It's not at all hard to picture a few Tikis hiding behind the foliage! 8-FT and I looked, but found none.

As someone who grew up around there, but was too young to know what Trader Vics even was (I was 11 and we didn't make it to that part of KC very often)
What effect, if any, did the Crown Center Skywalk collapse in 1981 have on TV's? I know there was a lot of investigating and reconstruction afterwards obviously.

Just curious.

Ever since I was a kid the first thing to pop up in my mind when Crown Center came up was the news flash that came up on the TV moments after it happened. It was pretty wild, though obviously my memory was cloudy on it because I always remembered it happening on New Years Eve, but the online articles said it happened in July.

On 2012-01-03 11:30, TravnerRavenweird wrote: What effect, if any, did the Crown Center Skywalk collapse in 1981 have on TV's? I know there was a lot of investigating and reconstruction afterwards obviously.

Just curious.

There really was no measureable effect on the Crown Center Hotel.
The collapse of the skywalks was at the Hyatt Regency; a different hotel which is located about 2 blocks Northeast of the Crown Ctr. Hotel/Trader Vics. The 2 were not connected in 1981.
Ironically, today they are "connected" by a glass skywalk that allows pedestrians to walk in climate controlled comfort many feet above street level. This also reduces cross walk congestion in the area. The walkways also connect to the historic Union Station Railroad depot. Silverline and I used this walkway to view and shoot photos on the day we visited the old Vics location. Here's an aerial view and an interior one.

On 2012-01-03 16:40, 8FT Tiki wrote:There really was no measureable effect on the Crown Center Hotel.
The collapse of the skywalks was at the Hyatt Regency; a different hotel which is located about 2 blocks Northeast of the Crown Ctr. Hotel/Trader Vics. The 2 were not connected in 1981.
Ironically, today they are "connected" by a glass skywalk that allows pedestrians to walk in climate controlled comfort many feet above street level. This also reduces cross walk congestion in the area. The walkways also connect to the historic Union Station Railroad depot. Silverline and I used this walkway to view and shoot photos on the day we visited the old Vics location. Here's an aerial view and an interior one.

Ok, that would make sense then. Like I said as a kid we never went over there. Why I don't know actually, we went to the Country Club Plaza often enough. I think I was 35 the first time I went to Crown Center after not living in the region for 15 years. I guess my 11 year old brain combined the two since I had no point of reference.

Thanks DC, your Google must work better than mine or I missed that when I searched. I did find that Washington State University Libraries has a small amount of Trader Vic information contained in a Westin Hotels records archive.